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Water Pistols. Whenever possible, the astronauts cast their eyes earthward to see how much could be described from 200 miles out in space. On the fourth day, Conrad's 20/15 vision picked out the contrails of planes flying below, the streets of Jacksonville, and the wake of a ship off the coast of Florida. He also took pictures of the landscape, including Cuba. Spy in the sky? "Just scenic shots," said Conrad dryly.
Toward the end of the 47th revolution, he scored a space first—the visual sighting of a missile launching. "I see it, I see it," cried Conrad, as the 60-ft. Minuteman burst through the clouds over Vandenberg A.F.B. The Air Force had timed the lift-off to test whether Gemini 5 could locate and photograph such an operation. Several revolutions later, the astronauts spotted a second Minuteman launch from Vandenberg.
By that stage of the flight, the astronauts were sleeping about six hours in each 24 and eating three daily meals of bite-size, freeze-dried food, which they rehydrated with a water pistol. They munched on cold spaghetti and meatballs, chicken sandwiches, and peanut cubes. They were feeling fine. "Gordo and Pete," Dr. Berry called up, "you've had 100 hours now, and all the [health] data look really excellent. All the rates and pressures are still well within normal range." Even the "lack of blue-bag activity" did not bother the medical men; Conrad had had only one bowel movement and Cooper none, which was not unusual on their low-residue diets.
"Zap!" A new mechanical problem cropped up on the fifth day. Two of the eight tiny 25-lb. thrusters jammed. Forced to rely more heavily on the other thrusters, Cooper used up considerable fuel, leaving only 17 Ibs. for the rest of the trip. Ground control suggested that Cooper might indulge in "a couple of rolls and a loop" to celebrate when Gemini 5 cracked the time-in-space record held by Russia's Vostok 5. Cooper said he could not spare the fuel—and besides, "That's all we have been doing all day is rolling and rolling."
The endurance record fell as the clock at Mission Control ticked off 119 hr. 6 min. from liftoff. Sitting at his control panel, Kraft said just one word: "Zap!"—a Buck Rogers exclamation to describe the blast of space guns. Then he got on the line to Cooper: "How does it feel for the U.S. to be a world record holder, Gordo?" Replied the laconic spaceman: "At last, huh?"
The rest of Gemini 5's flight was far from smooth. Because of the loss of thruster fuel, Kraft ordered the astronauts to limit their use of the jets and go into a drifting, tumbling flight. They had to scrub some of the remaining photographic experiments that required them to use the thrusters to get into a picture-taking position. Ground control was also worrying about the fuel-cell system again. The process of generating electricity by mixing hydrogen with oxygen was producing much too much of that inevitable byproduct: water. Ground control feared that the spacecraft was running out of storage space for water and that it threatened to back up into the cells and knock them out. Kraft informed Conrad of the problem and asked, "How's that for a surprise?" Cracked Conrad: "Nothing surprises me after lift-off."